Michael Hawthorne

Black and Latino toddlers may have significantly higher levels of toxic flame retardants in their bodies than white children, according to a new study that challenges one of industry's chief arguments for expanding use of the chemicals. The peer-reviewed study, to be published Wednesday in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, found flame retardants known as polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs, in the blood of all 83 children tested. But black and Latino toddlers had levels nearly twice as high on average as white children did. Led by Duke University chemist Heather Stapleton, the researchers also found that levels were higher in children whose fathers didn't have a...

Related "Michael Hawthorne" Articles

Black and Latino toddlers may have significantly higher levels of toxic flame retardants in their bodies than white children, according to a new study that challenges one of industry's chief arguments for expanding use of the chemicals.
The peer-reviewed...

The problem facing cigarette manufacturers decades ago involved tragic deaths and bad publicity, but it had nothing to do with cancer. It had to do with house fires. Smoldering cigarettes were sparking fires and killing people. And tobacco executives...

Most parents are forced to guess if toys, furniture and other household products are exposing their kids to toxic chemicals.
Heather Stapleton can figure it out in her laboratory.
Stapleton, an environmental chemist at Duke University, is one of the...

Trace amounts of sex hormones, prescription drugs, flame retardants and herbicides are being detected in treated drinking water pumped to more than 7 million people in Chicago and its suburbs.
In the latest round of testing prompted by a 2008 Tribune...

Chicago's first round of testing for a toxic metal called hexavalent chromium found that levels in local drinking water are more than 11 times higher than a health standard California adopted last month.
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Fallout from Japan's crippled nuclear reactors already is being detected thousands of miles away. But scientists who track pollution blowing across the Pacific Ocean say the amount of radioactivity should pose no danger to the United States.
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If a company dumped the black goop behind a factory, it would violate all sorts of environmental laws and face an expensive hazardous-waste cleanup.
But playgrounds, parking lots and driveways in many communities are coated every spring and summer with...

Chicago will begin routine testing for hexavalent chromium after a recent study found worrisome levels of the cancer-causing metal in tap water pumped to 7 million people in the city and suburbs.
City officials announced the additional testing Tuesday,...

Federal regulators on Tuesday urged nationwide testing for cancer-causing hexavalent chromium, the latest response to a study that found the heavy metal in tap water from Chicago and more than two dozen other cities.
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